Dozenal Society

[Thomas Puettmann]

The idea to use base 12 is by no means new. If I remember correctly, Pascal wrote a paper on computing in base 12 in the first half of the 17th century, and some decades later another famous mathematician (Leibniz?) advocated seriously for a change from the decimal system to base 12.

Historically, we owe a lot to the sexagesimal system of the Babylonians: The 360°, the 12 hours, the 60 minutes, and 60 seconds. Thus, a base with factor 12 is still omnipresent.

During the French revolution they tried to use base 10 everywhere. The day should have 10 hours with 100 minutes each, the week should have 10 days. There exist even revolution clocks of famous clockmakers like Berthoud that stick to this system. Exept for what we now know as "gon" (which I personally do not like very much because you frequently use 1/3rd of a right angle but almost never 1/5th) nothing survived.

Thomas